BETWEEN COLONIAL LEGACIES AND GLOBAL IMPULSES: Contemporary Queer Dominican Cultures February 14, 2007

A lecture with Maja Horn
Wednesday, 14 February, Noon
BCRW, 101 Barnard Hall
Free & open to the public; no reservations required.

The perceived progressiveness (or backwardness) of Latin American countries with regards to LGBTQ issues and communities typically is gauged through the presence (or absence) of LGBTQ social movements, political and policy activism, and public manifestations, such as gay pride marches. According to these indicators the Dominican Republic appears to be particularly homophobic and "backward." Yet, this prevalent perspective hardly leads to a better understanding of contemporary Dominican gay and lesbian lives and the sociocultural context that shapes these. Maja Horn, assistant professor of Spanish and Latin American cultures at Barnard, discusses some of the historical and cultural conditions out of which queer Dominican cultures and practices have emerged, and explores what other perspectives and parameters - beyond tropes of teleological development - might better account for these.

Maja Horn received her B.A. from Smith College, her M.A. in performance studies from New York University, and her Ph.D. in romance studies from Cornell University in 2005; her dissertation is titled: "Sounding Out: Gender, Sexuality, and Performance in Hispanic Caribbean and Caribbean American Writing." From 2005 to 2006 she was a research associate at FLACSO, the Latin American Social Science Institute, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Her research and teaching interests include Latin American and Caribbean literatures and cultures, performance studies, and gender and sexuality studies.